Denmark boasts one of the lowest COVID-19 death rates in the world. As of August 4, the Danes have suffered 616 COVID-19 deaths, according to figures from Johns Hopkins University.
That’s less than one-third of the number of Danes who die from pneumonia or influenza in a given year.
Despite this success, Danish leaders recently found themselves on the defensive. The reason is that Danes aren’t wearing face masks, and local authorities for the most part aren’t even recommending them.
This prompted Berlingske, the country’s oldest newspaper, to complain that Danes had positioned themselves “to the right of Trump.”
“The whole world is wearing face masks, even Donald Trump,” Berlingske pointed out.
From left to right: Professor Henning Bundgaard, Tamara van Ark, Anders Tegnell | Composite image by FEE (Rigshospitalet, Wikimedia Commons)
This apparently did not sit well with Danish health officials. They responded by noting there is little conclusive evidence that face masks are an effective way to limit the spread of respiratory viruses.
“All these countries recommending face masks haven’t made their decisions based on new studies,” said Henning Bundgaard, chief physician at Denmark’s Rigshospitale, according to Bloomberg News. (Denmark has since updated its guidelines to encourage, but not require, the use of masks on public transit where social distancing may not be possible.)
Denmark is not alone.
Despite a global stampede of mask-wearing, data show that 80-90 percent of people in Finland and Holland say they “never” wear masks when they go out, a sharp contrast to the 80-90 percent of people in Spain and Italy who say they “always” wear masks when they go out.
Dutch public health officials recently explained why they’re not recommending masks.
“From a medical point of view, there is no evidence of a medical effect of wearing face masks, so we decided not to impose a national obligation,” said Medical Care Minister Tamara van Ark.
Others, echoing statements similar to the US Surgeon General from early March, said masks could make individuals sicker and exacerbate the spread of the virus.
“Face masks in public places are not necessary, based on all the current evidence,” said Coen Berends, spokesman for the National Institute for Public Health and the Environment. “There is no benefit and there may even be negative impact.”
In Sweden, where COVID-19 deaths have slowed to a crawl, public health officials say they see “no point” in requiring individuals to wear masks.
“With numbers diminishing very quickly in Sweden, we see no point in wearing a face mask in Sweden, not even on public transport,” said Anders Tegnell, Sweden’s top infectious disease expert.
What’s Going on With Masks?
The top immunologists and epidemiologists in the world can’t decide if masks are helpful in reducing the spread of COVID-19. Indeed, we’ve seen organizations like the World Health Organization and the CDC go back and forth in their recommendations.
For the average person, it’s confusing and frustrating. It’s also a bit frightening, considering that we’ve seen people denounced in public for not wearing a mask while picking up a bag of groceries.
The truth is masks have become the new wedge issue, the latest phase of the culture war. Mask opponents tend to see mask wearers as “fraidy cats” or virtue-signalling “sheeple” who willfully ignore basic science. Mask supporters, on the other hand, often see people who refuse to wear masks as selfish Trumpkins … who willfully ignore basic science.
There’s not a lot of middle ground to be found and there’s no easy way to sit this one out. We all have to go outside, so at some point we all are required to don the mask or not.
It’s clear from the data that despite the impression of Americans as selfish rebel cowboys who won’t wear a mask to protect others, Americans are wearing masks far more than many people in European countries.
Polls show Americans are wearing masks at record levels, though a political divide remains: 98 percent of Democrats report wearing masks in public compared to 66 percent of Republicans and 85 percent of Independents. (These numbers, no doubt, are to some extent the product of mask requirements in cities and states.)
Whether one is pro-mask or anti-mask, the fact of the matter is that face coverings have become politicized to an unhealthy degree, which stands to only further pollute the science.
Last month, for example, researchers at Minnesota’s Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy responded to demands they remove an article that found mask requirements were “not based on sound data.”
The school, to its credit, did not remove the article, but instead opted to address the objections critics of their research had raised.
First, Do No Harm
The ethics of medicine go back millennia.
The Hippocratic Oath famously calls on medical practitioners to “first, do no harm.” (Those words didn’t actually appear in the original oath; they developed as a form of shorthand.)
There is a similar principle in the realm of public health: the Principle of Effectiveness.
Public health officials say the idea makes it clear that public health organizations have a responsibility to not harm the people they are assigned to protect.
“If a community is at risk, the government may have a duty to recommend interventions, as long as those interventions will cause no harm, or are the least harmful option,” wrote Claire J. Horwell Professor of Geohealth at Durham University and Fiona McDonald, Co-Director of the Australian Centre for Health Law Research at Queensland University of Technology. “If an agency follows the principle of effectiveness, it will only recommend an intervention that they know to be effective.”
The problem with mask mandates is that public health officials are not merely recommending a precaution that may or may not be effective.
They are using force to make people submit to a state order that could ultimately make individuals or entire populations sicker, according to world-leading public health officials.
That is not just a violation of the Effectiveness Principle. It’s a violation of a basic personal freedom.
Mask advocates might mean well, but they overlook a basic reality: humans spontaneously alter behavior during pandemics. Scientific evidence shows that American workplaces and consumers changed the patterns of their travel before lockdown orders were issued.
As I’ve previously noted, this should come as no surprise: Humans are intelligent, instinctive, and self-preserving mammals who generally seek to avoid high-risk behavior. The natural law of spontaneous order shows that people naturally take actions of self-protection by constantly analyzing risk.
Instead of ordering people to “mask-up” under penalty of fines or jail time, scientists and public health officials should get back to playing their most important role: developing sound research on which people can freely make informed decisions.
See the World Health Organization’s Latest Guidelines on Masks and COVID-19
Editor’s note: This story was updated to reflect Denmark’s recent update on mask guidelines.
Jon Miltimore
Jonathan Miltimore is the Managing Editor of FEE.org. His writing/reporting has been the subject of articles in TIME magazine, The Wall Street Journal, CNN, Forbes, Fox News, and the Star Tribune.
Bylines: The Washington Times, MSN.com, The Washington Examiner, The Daily Caller, The Federalist, the Epoch Times.
If you see anyone comply with this, please put them out of their misery as they are no longer human…they have morphed into compliant arseholes who should not be allowed to procreate. It cannot be any more obvious this is about COMPLIANCE and not containing any fake disease. Has the word ‘shame’ been expurgated from Webster?
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/peak-idiocy-wisconsin-government-agency-mandates-facemask-use-virtual-zoom-meetings
There is one thing I have learned in life and this is it. People with these letters associated with their name love POWER…..Dr. and Phd. They love to boss people around.
[My Dr. at the VA told me that he hated other doctors for that reason. Most ”Dr.s” are total snobs.]
Mr. Trump is ignorant about medicine plus he’s easily scared and he’s like a child. When fraud, snob, power crazed ”Dr” Fauci told him the entire planet needed LOCKDOWN, Trump went limp and caved. Now we see the horror of today.
All you Trump haters (seems that might include you, Don) listen to this vid from here:
https://youtu.be/sb9jRqgDOJ8?t=1107
Excuse me but I am NOT a Trump hater. I voted for him last time and will vote for him again. I have said that on this blog. Thank you. I have certain opinions about him but I do NOT hate him.
Where’d you get the idea I was Trump hater???
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Sure as hell seemed like that to me, but if not, I certainly apologize.
The final word in regard to masks…right in your face (or someone elses!)
https://153news.net/watch_video.php?v=BDD29R9S95YB
NIcholas II of Russia’s brother…..was he much less than one day?
Sorry, this was posted by mistake here in some weird computer glitch.
Will, you’ll appreciate this – check out James Tracy and his Guy Fawkes mask:
http://memoryholeblog.org/2020/08/09/covid19-demolitions-vaccines-censorship/
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Thanks for that, Toni. I carry that mask with me for that specific purpose, but I have yet to be stopped. I no longer shop at Walmart after my Capital One experience, so I do not know if I would be stopped. I’ve challenged the mask policy in about 7 stores now and have yet to be stopped………Lowes, Home Depot, Save-A-Lot, Walgreens, Roses and Family Dollar, and Tractor Supply……EXCEPT for Paneras…but I may try them again today or soon. I was weakly confronted in Home Depot, but just kept walking. and nothing further was said.
Same experience today, but I can add Harvet’s Market to my list. Walked by all the signs and no one said a word. Paneras was closed for inside dining…I suspect they are re-tooling their set-up to accommodate the ridiculous “social distancing”.
And what is going on in the UK and Australia is beyond the beyond. It’s a nightmare and the best I can speculate is that it’s a total communist take-over………expected, since they gave up their weapons.
In Melbourne we get fined for going outside our house unless: caring (visiting sick), shopping (once a day one person within 5km), work (must have form from boss if wrong boss gets up to 99000 fine), exercise (once with up to one persion, i hour a day, within 5km). You must wear a mask outside. This is nazi stuff. I can visit my mother as a carer and work because I am am in the building industry (they have reduced that , but want to keep it going $$$$$).
Daniel Andrews (our Stalin) started out by paying millions of dollar fines for not honouring the freeways contracts from the perviou government. He has brought in euthanasia https://www2.health.vic.gov.au/voluntary-assisted-dying Voluntary Assisted Dying
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The Victorian Government believes all Victorians are entitled to quality end of life care, which relieves pain and suffering, and provides compassionate support to family, friends and carers.
On 19 June 2019 the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2017 came into effect. Victorians who are at the end of life and who meet strict eligibility criteria can now request access to voluntary assisted dying.: Voluntary Assisted Dying
The Victorian Government believes all Victorians are entitled to quality end of life care, which relieves pain and suffering, and provides compassionate support to family, friends and carers. On 19 June 2019 the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2017 came into effect. Victorians who are at the end of life and who meet strict eligibility criteria can now request access to voluntary assisted dying.
So much for the hypocratic oath, more like “hypocritical oath”.
That is the down a dark road.
Th PETER PAN demic is a fraudulent psyop, the virus is real bur exaggerated.
Yes it is real but its been wildly exaggerated.
The USA lists about 161, 000 deaths. I suspect the real number is approx. 1/10 or less of that number.
I still know of no one who is sick or have died of this scamdemic.
Remember when NYC was screaming that hospitals were raging with covid patients? One resident of that hot spot went to his local hospital [an 8 story building] and found the place almost vacant….even the ER was a ghost town.
Don…Please watch this vid and tell me what you think….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-50ZJtx48k&feature=youtu.be&t=409
Excellent video.
Junk science is being used for political purposes to control the entire world…..etc.
Even common sense would tell us that wearing a mask for billions of people is totally weird. Its obviously meant to control people in some science fiction like movie. Its supposed to SCARE you and make you into some compliant robot.
SCARE SCARE SCARE then becomes FEAR FEAR FEAR, followed by death. Locked in your home for months and months in morbid fear is NOT good for your health. Like I said before the world is like some huge ghetto. This can only lead to mass death.
Are YOU wearing a mask??
Something to look forward to:
https://153news.net/watch_video.php?v=XYYUNYO9K747
((Instead of ordering people to “mask-up” under penalty of fines or jail time, scientists and public health officials should get back to playing their most important role: developing sound research on which people can freely make informed decisions.))
The research is there…. but as most with any level of awareness know, it’s not being disbursed on the MSM. Until (as in V For Vendetta) the media is re-purposed to provide the truth for We the People, and not as just an demand/monopoly of corporate propaganda/squawking that only serves the shareholders and the bottom line…..the truth will just languish in the crevices of alternative media.
And that just ain’t enough!
Think about the US media. The only “news” it disseminates is fake news: the scary “pandemic”. While the real news, the total destruction of the US economy and society, is completely ignored.
The US government has been overthrown and can now be viewed as the enemy.
This is where we are going……..
Our Interesting Times; 2020 August 8
https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/tkelly6785757/episodes/2020-08-08T06_09_24-07_00